About This Role
<p><b>Apps Development Group Manager</b></p><p><b>Trade Manager Zone Platform | Cash Securities Settlements | Equity Growth Initiative</b></p><p><b>Level: C14</b></p><div></div><p><b>About the Role</b></p><p>We are looking for an experienced <b>Apps Development Group Manager</b> to lead engineering for the <b>Trade Manager Zone (TMZ) platform</b> within the <b>Cash Securities Settlements</b> group, supporting the <b>Equity Growth Initiative</b>. This is a senior engineering leadership role that combines <b>hands-on technical contribution with organizational accountability</b> — you will be expected to stay close to the code and architecture while also owning the platform strategy, engineering standards, and team development across multiple squads.</p><p></p><p>You will be responsible for the reliability, scalability, security, and evolution of a mission-critical equity settlement platform, and will play an active role in embedding <b>AI and ML capabilities</b> into both the platform and the engineering workflow.</p><div></div><p><u><b>Key Responsibilities</b></u></p><p><b>1. Hands-On Technical Leadership & System Design</b></p><ul><li>Actively participate in system design, architecture reviews, and code reviews across TMZ platform teams.</li><li>Contribute to the design of <b>distributed, fault-tolerant, real-time systems</b> for high-volume, low-latency equity trade processing.</li><li>Write, review, and refactor <b>production-grade code</b> in Kotlin, Java, and Python — setting the technical bar for the team.</li><li>Lead design of <b>event-driven, microservices-based architectures</b> using Kafka or Solace — including message schema design, topic partitioning, consumer group strategies, and fault-tolerant processing.</li><li>Drive <b>low-latency and high-performance system design</b> — leading performance profiling, bottleneck analysis, and optimization of critical platform components.</li><li>Design and govern <b>data architecture</b> across Oracle (SQL) and MongoDB (NoSQL) — schema design, indexing strategies, query optimization, and data consistency patterns.</li><li>Champion <b>trunk-based development, feature flags, and progressive delivery</b> — contributing to CI/CD pipeline design and optimization.</li><li>Produce and review <b>architecture decision records (ADRs) and technical design documents</b> for key platform components.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>2. AI & ML Integration — Technical & Strategic</b></p><ul><li>Contribute hands-on to <b>AI/ML integration</b> on the TMZ platform — designing AI pipelines, evaluating ML frameworks, and reviewing AI model integration code.</li><li>Lead the implementation of <b>AI-powered platform capabilities</b> — intelligent exception handling, predictive settlement failure detection, anomaly detection on trade flows, and automated reconciliation.</li><li>Evaluate and adopt <b>GenAI and LLM APIs</b> — prototyping and architecting capabilities such as natural language interfaces for trade operations, AI-driven exception summarization, and GenAI-powered operational tooling.</li><li>Use and promote <b>AI-assisted development tools</b> (e.g., GitHub Copilot or equivalent) — driving team adoption and establishing best practices for AI-augmented engineering.</li><li>Lead the design of <b>AI/ML pipelines</b> on real-time trade event streams — working with data engineers and ML practitioners on feature engineering, model serving, and inference architecture.</li><li>Define and enforce <b>AI governance standards</b> — responsible AI practices, model explainability, auditability, and regulatory compliance.</li><li>Identify and prioritize <b>AI adoption opportunities</b> across the platform — focusing on high-value, engineering-led use cases.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>3. Engineering Excellence & Quality</b></p><ul><li>Set and enforce <b>engineering standards</b> across all TMZ teams — TDD, BDD, trunk-based development, CI/CD, secure coding, and observability.</li><li>Conduct <b>code reviews on critical platform components</b> — providing detailed technical feedback that improves team capability over time.</li><li>Drive adoption of <b>AI-powered quality practices</b> — predictive quality analytics, AI-augmented code review, and automated test generation.</li><li>Lead <b>performance engineering</b> — profiling JVM-based applications (Kotlin/Java), identifying hotspots, and optimizing critical settlement processing paths.</li><li>Own the <b>security and compliance posture</b> of the TMZ platform — involvement in threat modeling, vulnerability assessments, and secure design reviews.</li><li>Define <b>engineering metrics and KPIs</b> — DORA metrics, test coverage, MTTR, and platform SLIs — using data to drive continuous improvement.</li><li>Ensure all engineering delivery is aligned to <b>Citi Engineering Excellence Standards</b> — CI/CD, DevOps, cloud-native practices, and modern ways of working.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>4. Platform Strategy & Domain Ownership</b></p><ul><li>Define and own the <b>engineering roadmap</b> for the Trade Manager Zone platform, aligned to the Equity Growth Initiative and Cash Securities Settlements objectives.</li><li>Develop strong <b>domain knowledge</b> in equity trade lifecycle, settlement mechanics, and cash securities processing to inform sound engineering decisions.</li><li>Own the platform's <b>SLA, SLO, and SLI commitments</b> — driving architectural decisions to meet availability, throughput, and latency targets.</li><li>Lead <b>cross-platform integration</b> — governing API contracts, data flows, and system dependencies across the Cash Securities Settlements ecosystem.</li><li>Drive <b>capacity planning and investment prioritization</b> — decisions on platform scaling, technology refresh, and resource allocation.</li><li>Partner with <b>Operations, Risk, Compliance, and Business</b> teams to ensure the platform meets regulatory requirements and business needs.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>5. People Leadership & Team Development</b></p><ul><li>Lead and develop <b>multiple engineering teams</b> — building a culture of technical quality, accountability, and continuous learning.</li><li>Own the <b>talent strategy</b> for TMZ engineering — hiring, retaining, and developing engineers with expertise in financial systems, modern engineering, and AI/ML.</li><li>Develop the <b>next generation of technical leads and engineering managers</b> within the organization.</li><li>Mentor senior engineers and managers — providing technical coaching, architecture guidance, and career development support.</li><li>Drive <b>AI upskilling</b> across the team — building capability in AI tooling, prompt engineering, and responsible AI through direct mentorship and practical workshops.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>6. Stakeholder Engagement</b></p><ul><li>Act as the <b>primary engineering point of contact</b> for the TMZ platform with senior business, technology, and operations stakeholders.</li><li>Communicate <b>platform health, delivery progress, engineering strategy, and risk</b> clearly to senior leadership.</li><li>Partner with <b>Product, Operations, Risk, Finance, and Compliance</b> to align engineering priorities with business and regulatory needs.</li><li>Represent TMZ engineering in <b>cross-business technology forums and architecture councils</b>.</li><li>Manage <b>vendor and partner relationships</b> relevant to the platform — cloud providers, tooling vendors, and AI/ML partners.</li></ul><div></div><p><u><b>Skills and Qualifications</b></u></p><p><b>Must-Have Skills</b></p><p><b>1. Programming — Hands-On Proficiency</b></p><ul><li><b>Kotlin</b> Primary platform language — strong hands-on proficiency; write, review, and architect production-grade Kotlin services</li><li><b>Python</b> Hands-on expertise in data pipelines, AI/ML integration, scripting, and automation</li><li><b>Java</b> Extensive hands-on experience in high-throughput, production-grade Java engineering; JVM performance tuning</li></ul><div></div><p><b>2. System Architecture — Real-Time, High-Throughput & Performance</b></p><ul><li><b>Microservices Architecture</b> Hands-on design of microservices ecosystems — service decomposition, API design, inter-service communication</li><li><b>Event-Driven & Messaging Systems</b> Deep hands-on expertise in <b>Kafka</b> or <b>Solace</b> — topic design, partitioning, consumer groups, exactly-once semantics, high-throughput stream processing</li><li><b>Low-Latency & High-Performance Computing</b> Hands-on profiling and optimization — JVM tuning, GC optimization, thread management, memory profiling</li><li><b>High Availability & Fault Tolerance</b> Hands-on design of resilience patterns — circuit breakers, bulkheads, failover, and disaster recovery </li><li><b>Databases</b> Hands-on expertise in <b>Oracle (SQL)</b> — schema design, query optimization, indexing — and <b>MongoDB (NoSQL)</b> — document modeling, aggregation pipelines, sharding, replica sets</li></ul><div></div><p><b>3. Advanced Data & AI Integration</b></p><ul><li><b>AI & ML Integration</b> Hands-on experience designing and integrating AI/ML models — model serving, inference pipelines, real-time scoring, feature engineering </li><li><b>GenAI & LLM Integration</b> Hands-on experience with GenAI tooling and LLM APIs — prototyping, evaluating, and productionizing GenAI capabilities</li><li><b>Data Engineering</b> Hands-on expertise in data pipelines, streaming data processing (Kafka Streams, Flink, or equivalent), and data quality patterns </li><li><b>Intelligent Automation</b> Hands-on application of ML to automate exception handling, anomaly detection, and operational workflows</li><li><b>AI Governance</b> Establishing AI governance standards — explain ability, auditability, bias mitigation, and regulatory compliance</li></ul><div></div><p><b>4. Cloud & DevOps — Citi Engineering Excellence Standards</b></p><ul><li><b>Cloud-Native Engineering</b> Hands-on experience with <b>AWS, Kubernetes, and Docker</b> — container orchestration, autoscaling, and cloud-native deployment </li><li><b>CI/CD & DevOps</b> Hands-on design and ownership of CI/CD pipelines aligned to Citi Engineering Excellence Standards</li><li><b>Observability & AIOps</b> Hands-on experience with distributed tracing, intelligent alerting, and AI-driven observability</li><li><b>Secure Engineering</b> Hands-on threat modeling, vulnerability assessments, and secure design reviews</li><li><b>Agile at Scale</b> Agile/SAFe delivery at program level — PI planning, cross-team dependency management, delivery governance</li></ul><div></div><p><b>Good-to-Have Skills</b></p><ul><li>Hands-on experience with <b>real-time ML model serving</b> — feature stores, online inference, and model monitoring.</li><li>Familiarity with <b>RAG patterns</b>, vector databases (e.g., Pinecone, Weaviate), or agentic AI frameworks (e.g., LangChain, AutoGen).</li><li>Knowledge of <b>MLOps practices</b> — model versioning, deployment pipelines, and production model monitoring.</li><li>Understanding of <b>regulatory compliance frameworks</b> relevant to securities settlement (e.g., T+1, CSDR).</li><li>Experience with <b>chaos engineering and resilience testing</b> — fault injection and production readiness reviews.</li><li>Knowledge of <b>reconciliation and exception handling</b> patterns in settlement workflows.</li><li>Familiarity with <b>prompt engineering and LLM fine-tuning</b> in an enterprise, regulated context.</li><li>Experience with <b>technology investment governance</b> and engineering budget management.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>What We Are Looking For</b></p><ul><li><b>Stays hands-on</b> — actively contributes to design, code reviews, and technical problem-solving alongside the team.</li><li><b>Operates at two levels</b> — comfortable working at the code and architecture level while owning platform strategy and stakeholder relationships.</li><li><b>Pragmatic about AI</b> — identifies practical, high-value opportunities to apply AI/ML without losing focus on engineering fundamentals.</li><li><b>Accountable for outcomes</b> — takes ownership of platform quality, reliability, and delivery across the organization.</li><li><b>Develops people</b> — invests in engineers and managers, building technical capability and leadership depth across the team.</li><li><b>Communicates clearly</b> — able to translate technical complexity into clear, concise updates for business and senior leadership audiences.</li></ul><div></div><p><b>Why Join Us</b></p><ul><li>Lead engineering for a platform central to global equity trade settlement operations — while staying technically engaged.</li><li>Drive AI and engineering transformation as part of the Equity Growth Initiative, with senior visibility and business impact.</li><li>Work at the intersection of high-throughput financial systems and modern AI capabilities.</li><li>Build and develop a strong engineering team with access to good tooling, platforms, and talent.</li><li>Be part of an engineering culture that values technical depth at every level of seniority.</li></ul><div></div><p></p><p><b><u>Education:</u></b></p><ul><li>Bachelor’s degree/University degree or equivalent experience</li><li>Master’s degree preferred</li></ul><p><i>Cash Securities Settlements | Trade Manager Zone Platform | Equity Growth Initiative | C14</i></p><p></p><p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Job Family Group: </b></h2>Technology<p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Job Family:</b></h2>Applications Development<p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Time Type:</b></h2>Full time<p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Primary Location Full Time Salary Range:</b></h2>$145,100.00 - $217,700.00<p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Most Relevant Skills </b></h2>Please see the requirements listed above.<p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Other Relevant Skills </b></h2>For complementary skills, please see above and/or contact the recruiter.<p style="text-align:inherit"><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span class="WIN0">------------------------------------------------------</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p><h2><b>Automated Processing and AI</b></h2><p style="text-align:left !important">We use automated processing, including artificial intelligence, for our legitimate business interests (or our reasonable and appropriate business purposes) to identify and align the candidate's skills and abilities with a specific job opening. Additionally, if you so choose, or consent, we can match your skills and abilities to other suitable roles at Citi.</p><p style="text-align:inherit !important"></p><p style="text-align:left !important">Importantly, all our hiring processes and decisions, including determining your suitability for a role, are conducted, checked, and decided by individuals. Our automated processing and AI do not involve relying on automatic or autonomous decision-making. 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